Watch the World Burn
by Avana92
Summary: Years ago Draco Malfoy made the worst mistake of his life, now the Dark Lord is taking over and there's no one left to stop it.


**Disclaimer:** I don't earn any money on this and anything you recognize don't belong to me.

English isn't my first language so if you find grammar mistakes please let me know I'll happily correct them.

I recently stumbled upon the first half of this on my computer, I don't remember what I meant to write, but I thought I'd try and finish it.

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It wasn't until he found himself standing besides his parents in this circle of death, listening to the screams of his former classmates, with the stench of blood and death burning his lungs, that the fog lifted from his mind and he realized his world was burning. He could practically smell the fire, hear it roar, feel the flames dancing over his skin. And he knew without a shadow of doubt, why there was no one left to pour water on the flames. Why no one was stopping this. And it was all his fault.

...

It all started at the end of his fourth year at Hogwarts a couple of days after the third task. He was walking down a little used corridor near the library when Granger walked around the corner. He hadn't even realized he was smirking at her, till he heard her give an annoyed huff followed by the words: "What do you want now Malfoy?"

"Oh nothing really, just imagining the world without you. I doubt it will be long now, not when He is back," he drawled. When that failed to result in more than a rolling of her eyes he continued: "The world will be so much better without your dirty blood to sully it." He gave her his best smirk. There that had to do it, she was so much fun when riled.

But no, she just sighed: "You do know my blood is just as red as yours right?"

"You DO know that's not what I meant," seriously where was that fire. "Your blood means you are nothing, that you won't ever be anything in this world. And now that He is back it means you won't be in this world for long either."

He could see her ire building. Finally. But then it stopped, just as suddenly as it had begun. She bit back her retort and just looked thoughtful.

"Is that true?"

And then he was confused, that was not the response he was looking for.

"Is what true?"

"That I won't be anything in THIS world? That no matter how much I know, no matter how good I become, it won't matter? Just because of whom my parents are?"

"Well yeah," he said slowly, hadn't the Weasel told her already, "Without a proper family you could at best aspire to be a low level paper pusher". That had been unsettling so he quickly followed it with: "Not that it will ever matter now that He is back" and a good smirk. There much better, couldn't have her thinking you care one whit. Hopefully that would cause some kind of reaction in her.

But of course he was once again going to be disappointed, all Granger did was nod slightly to herself and mutter: "Right, right. That gives me a lot to think about." And then she just walked away, throwing a distracted "thanks," over her shoulder. That was definitely not the entertainment he was looking for. Annoying mudblood couldn't ever do anything right.

A quick tempus showed him it was almost time for dinner, and his annoyance was soon forgotten in the bubbling excitement for what the oncoming summer would bring.

...

Fifth year was rather uneventful. It turned out to be completely impossible to get any kind of reaction out of Scarhead and his favourite Mudblood. The Weasel was, as always, surprisingly easy to get riled up, but he was so mind numbingly stupid, it quickly lost the appeal, especially as the Weasel wasn't even around Scarhead and the Mudblood all that often.

Being part of the inquisitorial squad had at first seemed interesting. Having power over the Scarhead and his Mudblood was wonderful. Finally he was at his rightful place in the world. But they didn't care! They didn't even bat an eye when he took points for walking too fast, or tried to get them written up for having too many books out. And he couldn't actually catch them doing anything wrong. He had spent way to long stalking them, and all they did was spend time in the library, it was bloody infuriating.

There were, of course, plenty of other bloodtraitors and mudbloods at the school, but they weren't nearly as fun to annoy. On top of all that, Umbridge was really rather annoying. Sure it was great to have a defence teacher on his side, but he wanted to spend the DADA class trying to flick a curse at Scarhead or the Weasel without the professor noticing, not copying a stupid book. Fifth year was turning terribly dull very fast.

According to his father the Dark Lord was laying low, gathering his forces and planting his people at all the right places. So the owls circling the great hall weren't even carrying any ominous dark envelopes from the ministry, signalling the deaths of a bloodtraitor's or mudblood's relative.

All in all, this year was definitely not shaping up to be as amazing as he had thought.

...

When he got home for the summer his father was agitated and distracted, there was no way to get his attention for anything. All his father did was mutter about how Scarhead had somehow foiled this big plan, and now the Dark Lord was angry, and how on earth were they supposed to fix this. Of course it was all the fault of Scarhead and the Mudblood, they ALWAYS ruined everything.

...

Sixth year was the year everything changed. He noticed right away how Scarhead and the Mudblood weren't on the train. At the welcoming feast there were surprisingly few students to sort, and neither Scarhead nor the Mudblood was in attendance. That was great; they would start out the year by getting in big trouble. You couldn't just skip the welcoming feast, it just wasn't done.

Of course as the year went on, it became painfully obvious that Potter and the Granger hadn't actually skipped the welcoming feast at all. No they skipped the entire bloody year. The Weasel was walking around scowling at everyone, though that probably had more to do with the fact that he, contrary to what everyone else seemed to think, didn't actually know where they were. The Old Goat started out looking worried, but that had quickly changed to annoyed and even close to angry sometimes. Professor McGonagall seemed to have an even bigger stick up her arse than usual, as well.

Soon ministry owls carrying envelopes of death started circling the great hall at breakfast. He spent a couple of weeks searching for Scarheads' Toad. If the Dark Lord weren't lying low anymore, there was no way Aunt Bella would let the Toads parents survive any longer. Not when it was their fault she had spent time in Azkaban. But the Toad weren't there. And he was never going to tell anyone how long he had actually searched for that boy. Luckily there were plenty of mudbloods and bloodtraitors who burst into tears when they got their dark envelope, so he had something to laugh at.

When he went home for Christmas that year, his father gave him the inside scoop. Apparently, as far as they could tell, the Scarhead had left the country with a bunch of his friends and their families. Somehow they had warned a lot of the new mudbloods as well, and that's why there were so few new first years. They were all gone. The Dark Lord was happy, and everything was going according to the plan. He even shared a laugh and a scotch with his father. Everything was good.

...

The next months went by quickly. He got to laugh when another mudblood or bloodtraitor burst into tears upon receiving a dark envelope. He got to see pictures of the Dark Mark floating in the sky. Of course people were starting to get scared, but really that was just stupid, once they accepted that the Dark Lord had won, everything was going to be great. Seriously!

...

Now it was the middle of September, the Dark Lord had shown up at Hogwarts. Dumbledore had tried to gather his forces for an epic battle, in which the Dark Lord would finally be defeated, instead of fleeing to safety with all the young and vulnerable students.

According to his father, The Dark Lord had literally laughed at the measly resistance. The battle had been quick and once the resistance had been nullified, he had been task with helping to gather all the students.

And now here he was outside in the courtyard. He stumbled over rubble from the surrounding walls, towers and pillars. He dodged smoking and still burning bushes and branches, and what he studiously refused to acknowledge was most likely severed limbs. He noticed Professor Flitwick was stuck to a wall six feet of the ground, and hopefully very very dead, though he could have sworn he saw movement from what was left of the diminutive professor.

Apparently the Dark Lord was making a display. 'Resistance is futile'. Got it, message received loud and clear. Not that he ever had any intention of resisting; this was what he had been waiting for after all, was it not?

He moved across the courtyard to his parents' side, and noticed several of his classmates moving towards their parents. Greyback and some other Death Eaters were moving behind all the other students, blocking them in. Not that running back inside Hogwarts would be much of a help anyway.

The Dark Lord stepped forth and threw his arms out with a big smile on his face: "Welcome, welcome, students of Hogwarts. How nice of you all to join us." There was something rather disturbing in a happy Dark Lord.

"As I'm sure you can see, we have come to take over you school." He laughed, and all the Death Eaters followed suit. "Now you may try to resists, in fact I encourage it. Your headmaster's little army didn't put up that much of a fight, and my loyal followers could use a bit of sport." And they all yelled out with glee. He could see the fear in the eyes of the students across the courtyard, he could practically smell their terror and taste their horror as it radiated out from them.

"Naturally I welcome new recruits of good blood, so if you wish to join, all you have to do is step forward." It seemed impossible, but the Dark Lord somehow stood even taller, as He surveyed his new kingdom. "Step forward and bow before your new king." There was a smattering of mumbling and shuffling from the students, but no one dared to really move.

"NOW!" The Dark Lord bellowed, and he swore the sound echoed for minutes.

Slowly the students started to move forward. First one, then two and soon twenty and then thirty. They all moved slowly and stopped a good 15 feet in front of the Dark Lord, no one dared to move closer than that. They all bowed as the Dark Lord laughingly indicated for them to go lower and lower until they practically kissed the dirt.

One by one the Dark Lord welcomed them to his side of the courtyard, until only a fraction of the students were left blocked in. He recognised several mudbloods from his year and the year below, as well as the male and female Weasel, for some reason their parents hadn't left the country with Scarhead.

After a tense moment, where the now split group of Hogwarts students just stared at each other, the Dark Lord turned to his loyal followers and said laughingly: "I think it's time for my new recruits to show they are serious, what do you say?" The Death Eater all laughed and cried out in joy and amusement, Aunt Bella seemed particularly excited. But he had trouble mustering up the excitement, and he couldn't help but feel his parents didn't exactly have their heart in their chants either. Was this the new world order he had been waiting for? Watching his classmates torture each other, this was not the same as throwing a small hex or curse here and there.

If it was possible the _new recruits_ actually looked even more apprehensive than before. Of course they didn't know the Dark Lord like he did, they didn't know what they were being _asked_ to do.

"Uuhh. The ickle babies looked confused," Aunt Bella cackled. "Let me show them what to do," and a blood boiling curse flew towards the bloodtraitors and mudbloods. It hit a fifth year whose parents were both muggleborn. The small girl screamed and fell to the ground. Bellatrix held the curse until the girl fell silent, though he would have sworn he could still hear her screams.

"Beautiful, my dear Bella, simply beautiful," the Dark Lord cooed. "And now it's your turn," he laughed cruelly at the Hogwarts students.

When none of them moved, the Dark Lord turned his eyes towards Bellatrix, who somehow always seemed to know what He wanted, and her lightening reflexes had sent a curse flying towards the new _recruits_ before anyone could even blink.

The Dark Lord simply turned back towards the students and raised an eyebrow. The message was clear: fire or you're next. The screams of the boy Bellatrix had hit, was now mixed in the crying of his peers. Ever so slowly the air lit up as curses and hexes flew from his classmates wands towards the now crying muggleborns and students on the other side of this war.

The death eaters all laughed, Bellatrix's cackle particularly distinctive. He, however, looked at his parents and could see the same knowledge reflected in their eyes, this was a mistake. A horrible, terrible mistake. Backing the Dark Lord had been foolish. That Thing wasn't a revolutionary; He was a terrorist wanting to rule the world with fear.

Looking around and seeing Dumbledore's forces so easily defeated, seeing his classmates crying tears of fear or pain while doing as they were told, left no doubt in his mind: They needed Potter. The country needed the boy to rally behind, in order to fight back. The black-haired boy and his bushy-haired friend, who had left them all years ago, were necessary to defeat the madman in front of him. But they were gone; they had left the country for greener pastures, instead of staying and fighting for a country that tolerated their heritage at best. It ran cold down his back as he thought back to that day all those years ago where he opened Granger's eyes, and he wished with every fibre of his being that he had kept his mouth closed. Now he was forced to grin and bear it, as his world burned to ashes.

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 **An:** If you read so far, thank you for taking the time, I hope you enjoyed it :)


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